Medication Rules

by Bill Finley and Dan Ross The Louisiana Racing Commission has put in place what it is calling "Active Emergency Rules of Racing," to go into effect on June 8. These new regulations have raised the permissible dosage and shrunk the allowable withdrawal times for several medications, most notably the bronchodilator Clenbuterol and corticosteroid Depo-Medrol. The decision by the Louisiana Racing Commission--which has already garnered significant push-back from within and without the industry--was done in an attempt to make the sport safer, the Commission's Executive Director Stephen Landry told the...

The Board of the Association of Racing Commissioners International (ARCI) has unanimously requested the Federal Trade Commission to delay final action on HISA's proposed Anti-Doping and Medication Control rules until the constitutional questions being litigated are resolved, they announced in a press release Wednesday. "We cannot have a situation where an enforcement action is overturned because the authority of the enforcing entity to act is in question," said Ed Martin, ARCI President. "The only way to avoid that is to delay approval of HISA rules leaving existing state rules and...

The New York State Gaming Commission has announced that its Equine Medical Director Dr. Scott E. Palmer VMD and all three stewards will be made available to the media at the conclusion of the program to discuss any incidents that occur during the races at Saratoga Race Course Sept. 3. In addition, Dr. Palmer will be available to speak to the media in the event of any equine health-related on-track incidents that take place during the day. Dr. Luis Castro, the American Association of Equine Practitioners on-call veterinarian, will provide...

A year and a half after being signed into law, the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) is expected to kick into action Friday, meaning a new uniform set of medication rules and safety standards that everyone can abide by--that, at least, was the plan. The execution has somewhat thrown those intentions to the wind in the near term, with a piecemeal approach to implementation that has seen the anti-doping and medication control arm of the program pushed back to early next year, and several other features of the law--such...

Clenbuterol that is detectable in any amount on race day could be on its way out in 2021 for Thoroughbreds and Standardbreds in Maryland. Maryland Racing Commission (MRC) voted unanimously Oct. 22 to propose a new rule that would eliminate the allowable race-day threshold for clenbuterol, citing concerns that the bronchodilator medication has the potential for abuse as a substance that delivers similar results as anabolic steroids, like promoting an increase in lean muscle mass. Currently, Maryland horses are allowed to trigger up to 140 picograms/milliliter in blood serum on...